ScaleX can build a ladder for a quarter the price, though. Getting to the ceiling is easy these days - might as well let government blaze the trail where private enterprise won't go yet. Like all the way to the attic.

As opposed to most people on here who feel they're doing noble work and changing the world by confronting and antagonizing deeply religious people on facebook? That's surely the most noble of all pursuits.

Definitely a strawman. More appropriate for the "atheist" side would be:

"There are infinitely many things that could exist on the box given that we know nothing about it. Since we have no reason to believe that there is anything in particular in the box, it is best to withhold any sort of belief about its contents and not allow it to influence our lives."

Doesn't really fit well in a snappy comic, but it avoids the strawman. I also feel like the comic picks a poor analogy, as the existence of a deity isn't like a box hanging from a string. The purpose of a box as humans have designed it is to hold something, so I feel like it biases us toward the belief that there is a good chance there is something in the box. Of course its rational that there might be something in the box, you think. And, consciously or not, you're influenced toward the decision that this is an issue where an exact middle ground is most reasonable.

It would be more appropriate for the comic to have nothing in the middle. One side should to be claiming that there is an invisible box that can not be detected by any means hanging there, and that it contains a white ball. The other side should be claiming that they see no box and therefore don't believe in it. But that would ruin the effectiveness of the comic.

Unless of course this comic is a critique of gnostic atheism, in which case I would question its usefulness at all. I've never in my life met a gnostic atheist. Not to say they don't exist, but I suspect the vast majority of atheists, if pressed, would explain that they lack a belief in gods rather than believing that gods don't exist.

I guess it would be more accurate like this:
T - There is a full sized piano in that box
A - Dude, there isn't a piano in there, the box is too small
T - The box is bigger on the inside
A - Prove it, until you do, my stance is that there isn't any piano in there

I am a gnostic atheist because any human concept of a god is either logically impossible or not worthy of being called a god.

So to fit into the logic of the comic the "ballists" would be saying "we believe there is a white ball in there (let's assume they mean one which is a Euclidean sphere) which does not reflect light and which has six flat sides". This is not logically possible so obviously can not be in the box.

They could also be saying "We believe there is a white ball in there which is has all the attributes of a banana", I would call that a banana since we already have a word for it.

Now obviously if someone says they worship a totem pole, or a volcano, or the sun as "gods" I would clearly be a theist, as I believe those things exist. My problem here is in labeling such things as "gods", because calling those things gods does not give them any additional significance (other than culturally and historically). But that's just a digression.

I am a gnostic atheist because any human concept of a god is either logically impossible or not worthy of being called a god.

Can you expand on this a little.

Suppose the universe is some computer simulation. There would be no way to prove this. The creator of this simulation would have absolute power over the universe, and would have created the universe. This doesn't seem to be logically impossible, and I can't work out any reason this being should not be considered a god.

Well, apart from the fact that no theist would ever call such a thing a god this being would also not be all powerful. It may be extremely powerful within the bounds of our universe, but our universe would be revealed to be far smaller and less "universal" than we'd supposed. This being would also clearly not be able to do illogical things.

Such a being would have needed to evolve through Darwinian, or some other naturalistic mean (unless it is a simulation itself). The thing is, what makes this thing a god rather than just "the owner of the simulation"?

My thinking is that when the question moves away from discussion about theistic gods and moves towards discussion about hypothetical, unfalsifiable gods that are untestable and not useful then it becomes less of a question of atheism/theism and more of a philosophical discussion about epistemology.

It becomes a discussion about hypotheticals rather than gods, and hypotheticals are merely things that exist within the human mind.

I don't have a problem specifically with people who believe in deistic gods, but when there is no difference between your god existing and your god not existing then I think there is ample reason to say that it just made up.

Suppose the universe is some computer simulation. There would be no way to prove this.

That's a rather bold assertion. How do you know there would no way to prove that the universe is a computer simulation?

The creator of this simulation would have absolute power over the universe, and would have created the universe.

Would they? This creator would still be bound by principles of information theory and the laws of their own super-universe. We create computers and the programs that run on then, yet we don't have absolute power over them -- they are still constrained by natural laws.

It's possible that the simulants (if you want to call them that) would be able to work out some of the super-universal laws by identifying limitations and constraints in the simulation.

I can't work out any reason this being should not be considered a god.

"A god", you mean the supernatural patron of some religion? Or are you using some other definition?

I think that within the bounds that human knowledge allows we have as much justification to say that "we know no god exists" as we have to say anything else, if not more.

If you're going to be strict about it in terms of epistemology then it is indeed fair to say that we can never truly know anything. However, a definition of knowledge that makes it impossible to know anything is a rather useless definition.

I reject this notion that we can't know anything because it completely undermines the entire argument, and I don't mean it just undermines my own argument, it undermines the entire playing field. Saying that we can't ever discuss the issue because of some epistemological technicality seems to me to be the equivalent of flipping over the chess board and claiming neither side can win or lose.

w.r.t. whether any kind of god is logically possible, how can you prove that your logical reasoning is correc

If the logic that we use is not correct then any discussion about anything is completely meaningless. Logic is the only rationality we have. Dropping logic is the same as giving up rational argument.

I'd say - and I think many others would as well - that I actively believe that god, as defined by any of the major religions, does not exist. I don't claim that I can prove it, or that I know it with the most absolute certainty, but I certainly believe it very strongly.

Honest questions: Where does your concept of a god come from, if not from one of the major religions? Also, still genuine: would you say you are agnostic about the pink unicorn I'm sitting on right now?

Where does your concept of a god come from, if not from one of the major religions?

Well, first I need to state that I use the term "god" pretty loosely. For example, one idea that I might contemplate (not necessarily meaning I subscribe to it, just merely contemplate) is the idea of a collective consciousness. Or to use a bit from a Bill Hicks quote to describe that "...we are all one consciousness experiencing itself subjectively..." This isn't really something that falls under most traditional definitions for the term god, but I personally feel that it's close enough given the context of this type of thought.

With that said, the concept I use essentially comes from what I perceive to be nearly infinite conceivable possibilities for what can fall under the umbrella of a loose definition for the term god, and another infinite possibilities that our brains couldn't even try to conceive without getting incredibly abstract. I can certainly go on about this more, but I'll leave it at this for now and add more if you ask more.

would you say you are agnostic about the pink unicorn I'm sitting on right now?

Not at all. I mean, I can't exactly prove you aren't sitting on a pink unicorn, but I am not agnostic about it in the least. I like this type of question though, and I have two responses for it.

Firstly, I am not agnostic about the unicorn the same way I am not agnostic about [insert whatever specific religion here]. I don't place anymore consideration to Christianity (or Hinduism, or Islam, or whatever) being true than I place in Star Wars being true. I don't need to have some ultimate answer I believe in order to call out another answer as being ridiculous. I have an analogy I like to use for this (FAR from a perfect analogy, but I think it does a good job of describing my thoughts about it.)

Imagine you have a dice with a shitload of sides. Enough sides to where just luckily guessing a roll is extremely unlikely. A thousand sides. Actually, a million sides, or even better, a billion, whatever. If it's rolled, I don't know what's going to come up, but if you tell me it will be "105", I will say you're full of shit. I mean, I guess it could land on that, but it's ridiculously unlikely.

One obvious flaw with the analogy is that it seems as if I'm implying any given un-provable idea is as likely as any other idea (provable or not.) I'm definitely not saying that at all, and could probably add to analogy to make it a little more applicable by maybe saying the person claiming what number comes up is picking a number that isn't even on the dice, or something like that, but I think I'm already getting wall-of-texty.

Secondly, about the pink unicorn, I may not be agnostic about you sitting on a pink unicorn, but I certainly am agnostic about you sitting right now. The more specific an un-provable claim is, the less agnostic I am about it, and it takes very little specificity to pretty much toss most of my agnosticism out the window.

I mean, the agnostic about sitting may not be a perfect response at all, given that I am sitting right now. People sit all the time. I know sitting is something that happens and is real. God, pink unicorns, and stuff like that, not so much. But I think it's adequate enough to get the basic gist across about how adding specificity reduces how agnostic I am about it (this ties back in to what I said in the the beginning about infinite conceivable possibilities and such.)

If you place equal consideration between Christianity and Star Wars, then you are an atheist specifically towards Christianity (and probably generally as well). Atheists don't need to claim to know there is no God, that is indefensible. If we merely "not-believe-in" then we are an atheist. Just like you are an atheist about Bassman sitting on the pink unicorn. You are an atheist about beliefs you have never heard of. Agnosticism/gnosticism concern knowledge, theism/atheism concern belief.

One side should to be claiming that there is an invisible box that can not be detected by any means hanging there

This is a great example of the kind of logical refutation that is trivial.

If the box were invisible, its contents would be easily visible. Therefore this claim that there is a ball in the invisible box cannot describe an objectively real phenomenon.

What usually happens at that point is that the claimants rapidly modify their claims: "Oh, the box causes its contents to become invisible too! We didn't know that before but now that you've pointed out the error, this must certainly be the case."

And then you know you're dealing with an unfalsifiable claim that will will always be changed under scrutiny, and those claims may be dismissed without a second thought as failing to describe an objectively real phenomenon.

Richard Dawkins says the same thing. In The God Delusion, he says that technically speaking he'd have to call himself an agnostic, because he can't prove with 100% certainty that there is no god, just like you can't disprove Russel's teapot.

But that doesn't make the existence of a god as likely as the non-existence of a god, and none of the evidence available to us suggests that god is anything other than man-made.

I wish everyone would understand that 100% certainty isn't a thing. If you are certain about any real world event or thing you are provably irrational. This is why when I say God doesn't exist I mean that the possibility is so small as to be insignificant, not that I am 100% certain. I'm not 100% certain that the sun rose today, and I saw it with my own eyes. But it's a 99.999% with a lot of 9's

I doubt it's possible to put down a percentage and say something like "I highly doubt it; I'm 99.999% certain there's no god." How? What's your basis? For all we know, there could be some kind of "intelligent mind" running things behind the scenes. It's beyond our realm of possible understanding. Sure we have science to explain everything, but it's "possible" that some intelligent creator made us and all the natural laws/rules and then left us alone. Of course, just because it's possible doesn't mean it's worthy of being believed. And I don't believe it. But I don't understand how you can tack on a number like "99.999% sure." What's your basis? I think it's one of those things that's simply "possible," but I don't have the resources to dub it "unlikely" or "likely."

When someone asks me if I believe in god I say, "No I don't. It's possible there was some kind of 'intelligent designer,' but who the fuck knows? I barely know how my microwave works, let alone the universe."

I agree with you about absolute certainty being a fallacy, but I prefer a different approach concerning the possibility of god(s). I am unsure about the existence of some cosmic architect(s), as I don't think we have enough information.

I am however 100% certain that none of the religious "explanations" are correct or have any truth to them at all. If any religion had even one thing correct concerning absolute truth (whatever the hell that is), it would be purely a wild coincidence.

There you go being 100% certain... that's infinitely certain, you can't do that uness you have an infinite amount of evidence or you just assumed it irrationally. And you're wrong about there being no truth in any religion, that's just ridiculous.

I am unsure about the existence of some cosmic architect(s), as I don't think we have enough information.

But everything we do have points towards such a thing as not being needed. Additionally, at every point in the past where we thought that a "cosmic architect(s)" could be an explanation, we have shown it is not the case.

I doubt you hold "I am unsure about the existence of some cosmic donkey, as I don't think we have enough information." as a worthwhile statement to hold to, so why the exception?

It's called normalisation, since there is an infinity of non-sense we can't disprove instead of walking around pretending like it might be true the only rational thing to do is to assume it's all false.

But I will make further claims: that if the box is unknowable in nature, it is meaningless, and that if one wastes their life and the life of others obeying humans who claim to speak for the box, they are seriously deluding themselves.

Dammit, NO. I am agnostic, and not in a way that you define. I adamantly refuse, as most agnostics, to make ANY inference towards what the fuck is in that box. Why must you put an atheist spin on it? It's not that I think the box is empty but don't claim to know. It's not that I think there is a ball in there but don't claim to know. JUST I don't know. That's IT. Agnosticism in the way I live it is true neutral, because as this comic says, neither of you know. Therefore, I make no attempt at knowing. Your definition would make us self conflicting morons, saying "lol I don't think so but who knows". It's not willful ignorance, it's the concrete belief that nobody knows. Stop trying to make it any different, we don't try to define your beliefs, don't do it to us.

I'm not sure I understand. Agnostic atheists also believe that nobody knows. We just say that since we do not actually believe in any deities we cannot be theists, and therefore we must fall into the logically complementary position of being atheists.

There is no middle ground between "I believe in X" and "I don't believe in X"; the only way I can come close to justifying such an opinion is rapidly vacillating between states of belief.

There is no middle ground between "I believe in X" and "I don't believe in X"

If you treat it like a binary problem like that, sure. But why can't we discuss the probability of 'X'? If 'X' is 'the God of Isreal as described in the OT exists,' I would say that's a possibility in the same way that it's possible for me to stick my hand through a wall, IE technically possible (yay quantum physics), but near-zero probability.

How can you answer "maybe" to the question of "I believe in a deity"? Belief is a binary proposition - that doesn't mean that not believing something implies that you believe the opposite, it just means that there is no coherent belief system that includes neither "I believe X" or "I don't believe X".

What does "maybe" even mean when you're discussing beliefs? That you kinda do and kinda don't? That you consider discussion of beliefs meaningless?

In my experience - and I say this as somebody who used to identify purely as an agnostic - the entire issue is one of self-identification. Agnostics usually define atheists as people who believe the opposite proposition to theism (i.e. atheists believe there is no god). When contrary definitions are presented (typically that atheists lack belief in any and all deities, and that some are gnostic about this and others agnostic), it doesn't seem to matter. The reason, in my opinion, is that they have a strong dislike of the people who identify as atheists and do not wish to be lumped in with them, no matter how similar their beliefs actually are.

Belief is not a binary proposition. Its completely possible to hold the belief in a possibility. I don't know whether or not pineaplasasin had a beer after work yesterday, but I believe its possible. There is also no reason for me to default to a negative proposition on that question, it simply doesn't matter enough to me to have a granulated opinion on the matter.

That being said, I myself am an atheist but completely appreciate someone wishing to describe themselves as simply agnostic and still being intellectually honest.

Sure, but that's not what I meant. Belief is binary, the propositions in which you believe are not necessarily so (as an example, you might believe "I believe there's a 13% chance my car was dinged by Fred.", but to say "I 13% believe my car was dinged by Fred." is meaningless). Unless of course you mean "I believe, rationally, X, and, irrationally, don't believe X" (or similar, mutually contradictory mental states).

I don't know whether or not pineaplasasin had a beer after work yesterday, but I believe its possible.

Exactly, you believe it's possible, you don't possibly believe.

There is also no reason for me to default to a negative proposition on that question, it simply doesn't matter enough to me to have a granulated opinion on the matter.

Agreed. So instead of believing the converse (i.e. "I believe pineaplasasin didn't have a beer after work yesterday") you believe the complementary (i.e. "I do not believe pineaplasasin had a beer after work yesterday"). That's exactly the agnostic atheist position; gnostic atheists believe there are no gods, agnostic atheists simply lack belief in gods.

That being said, I myself am an atheist but completely appreciate someone wishing to describe themselves as simply agnostic and still being intellectually honest.

I wouldn't say that it's intellectually dishonest, simply that they're defining the atheist position in opposition to their own despite many atheists using a different definition.

I do, however, wish that a self-identified agnostic would just acknowledge that they meet the definition for "agnostic atheist", but do not wish to identify themselves like that.

as this comic says, neither of you know. Therefore, I make no attempt at knowing.

Neither do we. We do not claim to know what is in the box, but the default assumption, in the absence of evidence, is that there is nothing inside the box. You seem to be thinking that atheists are like "OBVIOUSLY WE KNOW THERE IS NOTHING IN THE BOX". We don't make any claim of knowledge, we rest on the default assumption.

That's wrong though. You're accepting the premise of the comic, when in fact the comic frames the question in an incredibly dishonest way, such that it isn't analagous to atheism at all.

If we have a sealed box, the default position is simply that we don't know what's inside. Why would the default assumption be that it's empty? That doesn't make any sense, particularly given what we know about boxes, which is that they are containers built to contain things.

We could just open the box, or if that's impossible, we could weigh it, scan it, you get the picture. Based on further information gathering we could get a better idea of what it contains.

You've captured some of what I was thinking. The other piece that concerns me is the notion that the writing of the ancients is used to parallel biblical writings. Since the symbolism of the box as universe is faulty, so is this parallel. In truth, in Native culture there is a strong oral tradition of passing down history. In a similar way, there was a story a couple of weeks ago that got some attention on Reddit about an island community's response to a quake based on oral information passed down through generations, which reportedly saved many lives.

So you don't believe that there is 'something in the box'? Lacking this POSITIVE claim makes you an A-something-is-in-the-boxist.

Additionally, you lack the positive belief that there is 'nothing in the box'. Lacking this POSITIVE claim makes you an A-nothing-is-in-the-boxist.

These are two distinct beliefs. Summing the two claims together, you admit ignorance of the contents of the box.

If you do not have a positive belief that god exists you are an atheist: someone who does not believe in god, completely separately of whether you believe there is no god (a positive belief in no god).

Atheist/Theist is a dichotomy, there are only two choices. Theism is the state of belief in god/s. Atheism is defined as the lack of that state. One is in the atheist state even if they are UNAWARE or claim IGNORANCE i.e. they lack a POSITIVE belief in god/s.

Stop trying to make it any different, we don't try to define your beliefs, don't do it to us.

"Agnostic" was coined by someone who defined it in consideration of their own definitions of concepts like "atheism", and then proceeded to project their personal view of atheism onto people who already identified as atheists and obviously had no need to care about what he thought of their views. Basically, the idea was that if an agnostic doesn't know something, then an atheist is someone who claims to know their is nothing. The end result is that over a century ago you had people pointing out that that wasn't the case, today you have comics like this which have to define atheism in a particular way to make a point that just comes across as confusing to a community full of atheists, and then "agnostics" coming into that community to tell atheists that they don't define their beliefs, all the while continually misunderstanding those beliefs based on their terrible definition.

This is a matter of semantics. There are people out there, such as yourself, who refuse to regard themselves as theists or atheists. They claim they are "agnostic," a third-choice. The problem is that the vast majority of atheists also call themselves agnostics.

That is because "atheism" and "theism" are terms asking and answering different questions than "agnosticism." An atheist or theist does not profess to "know" or "not know" whether there is a god. Rather, they profess to "believe" or "not believe" in a god. And you either believe or you don't believe, making everyone either an atheist or a theist.

But wait, you say; I simply don't know! That's fine, and it makes you an agnostic, but I'm not asking you what you do or do not know. I'm asking you what you believe. And if you're not "sure," then it doesn't seem like you actively "believe," making you an agnostic-atheist. When you were born, and you didn't have the human faculties necessary to believe in anything, you were an atheist. You simply "did not believe," regardless of what you knew or didn't know.

There are agnostic theists out there as well. People who say "well, I don't know for sure whether there's a god, but I believe in one anyway because it'd make me feel more comfortable, or because I just feel that there must be one, or because I simply do believe, with no explanation, and you can just deal with it."

And there are, of course, agnostic atheists. Some say "I highly doubt there's a god, so I have no reason to believe in one," and others say "I have no fucking clue or I don't fucking care." Now, the latter group, unlike the former, failed to mention anything about "belief." But if you do not actively profess believe, then you DON'T believe, making you an atheist. Believing in something is an active venture. You either do or you don't.

So you're "Agnostic," that's pretty cool. That also doesn't say anything about what you believe, only how certain you are about that belief. It's impossible to live "true neutral." You either follow the rules of a religion, or you don't. Even though you make no attempt at knowing, you're still living your life one way or the other. If you're not sure whether or not there is a higher power, but you decide to hedge your bets and follow a religion, you're an agnostic theist. If you're not sure and don't ascribe to any religions, you're an agnostic atheist. If you're not comfortable calling yourself an atheist, that's cool, lot's of people aren't. But you can't just make up a definition for something and then tell people who know the correct definition that they aren't allowed to use it.

You are aware, then, that 99.99% of atheists believe exactly as you do and are, by your own very technical and impractical definition, agnostic? We call ourselves atheists because the word 'agnostic' is retarded and exists only out of misplaced deference to the status of reliigion.

While he may or may not understand agnostic atheism, we cannot rule out the possibility that the artist might be an apatheist. It seemed like it was a rather "agnostic" comic strip at first, but the last panel, the punchline if you will, really seemed like it came from the vantage point of apatheism, that one simply doesn't care.

Edit: Goddamn it, looks like somebody already responded to this post about apatheism. Oh well, I'm fucking drunk and /r/atheism is full of repost apologists anyway. At the very least it seems like this sub-reddit rather enjoys reposts.

I understand the metaphor, but it doesn't apply to the real world. The group on the right (non-believers) would love nothing more to look in the box, and if there were nothing, they'd stick to that disbelief; if there were a ball, they would switch their beliefs. The group on the left, also seeing no ball, would claim that the ball is invisible and can't be felt.

I actually felt it was a bit harsh too. But you have to admit, for someone so wrapped up in their beliefs who is not willing to even look in the box, proof that there is no ball would probably lead them to say, "it is a matter of faith."

Would you, as an agnostic, show yourself to the door when the religious side is affecting your society because of what he claims that is inside the box, with no further arguments? I would see your point if the only thing that came with religion was an intellectual discusion, but that's not the case.

What would constitute the exterior of the box for the conundrum of our age? Does God or Gods come with some sort of visible box exterior that Theists make claims over?

Atheists do not claim there's no God. We just say there's not enough evidence to solidly prove its existence. Until there are evidences, proofs, scientific theories and laws, there's no point in making up stories to say something without an evidence exists. Also the scientific reach of human is much farther out than 'not knowing' about the entire content of that box.

It's more like a box with bunch of holes we can kind of take a peek at, and guess what's in it. But the Theists are denying the whole evidence - resorting to superstition.

If God came down one day and performed miracles before our eyes, and God subjected itself to our tests and examination and the miracle was indeed legit- I still wouldn't believe in the God, but I will admit that the God exist. That is the position of Atheists.

theists believe that there is something in the box, and atheists don't. I mean they litereally don't believe that there is anything. they don't claim to know that there is nothing, they just don't know. This is what the guy in the middle does. He doesn't know.

so basically this is just a wrong view on atheism (if it was intended to show the two sides as theists contra the atheists) and nothing has anything to do with agnosticism.

There's no shame in being wrong. Form a belief. Accept the possibility you might be wrong.

Let's assume that the person in the left says "it's filled with lead". You point out the string is very thin. So he says "it contains a ball". You manage to shake it and there's no indication that there's anything inside, so he says "It contains some paper". You eventually climb up and see that it has a transparent top. There's nothing visible inside and he says "it's filled with a clear gas other than air".

They can see the box then they can probably figure out the physical properties of the box. Replicate the box with normal air inside, hit that and compare the sound to hitting the original box. You could then probably take it a step further by filling the replicate box with different gases in order to narrow down a list of possible gases.

The problem with the analogy is a ball is a terrible comparison to god, a ball is something logical, it's possible one could be in the box, something they may have seen before elsewhere.

Now compare to god, we've never seen any past proof of other gods or similar beings, there are many, many logical flaws in the possibility of a god and it's simply not logical.

It's like if they said there was an elephant in the box who is half dog and half cat who controls the universe and is all powerful but was trapped in there by his own father who is also himself who is an evil lion. You can dismiss that theory without 'prodding' the box because it's clearly illogical.

It's actually a fully complete definition in terms of religion, some dipshits just decided they needed to make all these arbitrary labels for agnosticism/gnosticism. It's perfectly acceptable to entertain both possibilities without leaning in either direction.

I guess it would be reasonable to not be curious about the dragon, but a lack of curiosity in a claim like that implies that you don't believe the claim.

If I said I was going to shoot you, and you weren't worried, it would be because you believed that I wasn't really going to shoot you. Similarly, if I told you that you'll be thrown into a pit of fire and you weren't worried, I think I could safely say that you probably believed that you weren't going to be thrown into a pit of fire.

Refusing to take a stand can be rational when there are many choices that are difficult to evaluate, and the consts associated with evaluatiing them is greater than the benefir of making the "best" choice. This is why people don't agonize for hours over which of the 200 brands of shampoo at the supermaket is really the best for them. It also hasperhaps unfortunate implications about voter behavior. It's called 'Rational Ignorance."

and then all the non-believers left too cause they felt like they were wasting there time, however some of the more radical believers followed them and tried to drag them back. Next, the non-believers with the highest education stood up to reason with the faithful in an attempt to allow those that were prosecuted a chance to live as well as they could before their times ran out. not that it made much impact on the fundies attempts

or if you prefer...

once all the non-believers left, the believers began dividing into separate factions with menial differences. as time progressed it took less and less to validate separation into smaller groups. eventually no one even remembered that they originally thought it was white, in fact, no one even thinks its a ball anymore, nor do they remember thinking so. all the while the non-believers were having crazy monkey parties with all the aliens they met across the cosmos because they, through reason and advancement, realized that it was best to leave the nest because of an impending apocalyptic something or other.

It's another great example of how "agnostics" still don't know what agnosticism or atheism means. If the person in the middle doesn't believe the ball inside the box is white then s/he is an "Atheist".

The box exists... it is empirically observable and there is visual evidence of its existence.

A better analogy would be if the believer was asserting the existence of an invisible box with a ball in it, then dismissing calls for evidence for the existence of the box.

The believer in the imaginary box then finds other folks whom he is able to convince with flawed logic and veiled threats (those who do not believe in the box face eternal entrapment in a larger, darker box).

These people join together to form the Boxtians, who, getting tired of constantly having to explain the absurdity of believing in an invisible box with a ball in it, rape and pillage towns, take over governments and impose upon everybody that belief in the invisible box is logical and normal, and that anybody who does not believe in the invisible box has to prove the invisible box does not exist, which is impossible - "Boxtians: 1, Atheists: 0"

It annoys me greatly that many of the self-proclaimed "agnostics" are trying to force definitions into place that are technically incorrect. They seem to be under the impression that it's a flip of a coin type of situation, something like:

Theists believe with certainty that there is a god

Atheists believe with certainty that there is no god

This is shoehorning the rejection of belief into a simple gnostic definition rather than a broad spectrum of views on the subject matter. For any "agnostics" in this thread, please go and read this. The picture demonstrates it nicely.

so if anything is unverifiable/unproven, theres a possibility it might be true? in that case, a million-strong army of koalas are planning on taking over the earth. i know this because they told me, and me alone.

I've never met an atheist who said that god definitely does not exist. Yet I always see self proclaimed agnostics talk down about atheists as if we do. Get over yourselves, stop playing semantics and stop being a fucking pussy by labeling yourself as an agnostic. You're like a gay guy stuck in the closet and lying to himself as 'bisexual.'

I'm quite certain that most agnostics would discard christianity as fairy tales right away. I do, as I do with all other religions that try to be specific about their nature. But I cannot discard the thought of a abstract demiurge/first mover in the same way, even though I believe it's rather pointless to speculate about it. Whatever "started" or "created" or whatever, would be too out-of-our-league to comprehend and in that perspective it would be pure academical nomenclature to classify it as a deity or a physical phenomena.

If the "believers" in this comic had said "we saw someone put the ball in the box" I would most likely believe them, the fact that I know what a ball is, and I know the physical properties of both the box and other balls. Because of these things I could from a witness and my previous knowledge of boxes and balls extrapolate that it is likely that a ball is in there.

I can believe things without any evidence if I can make these extrapolations.

But this cartoon misses the point! The Ballians don't just believe in the Ball, but also base their moral decisions on what they believe the Ball would want in the expectational that thy will be rewarded by the Ball after death!
The aballists do not assert that the Ball doesn't exist, they simply say that there is no evidence for it and THEREFORE basing one's moral decisions on it is irrational.
The douche bag in the middle is a smug fence-sitter who is too lazy to interpret the arguments properly and ignores the huge impact that various hypothetical Balls have on the world today.

Dawkins has a good counter-argument for this type of stance. Basically, there is zero evidence of a god; treating it like this box metaphor is ridiculous, because the sides are given equal value in terms of probability when that is most definitely not the case. In fact, given what we know about the earth and life and science, it is incredibly unlikely that a god created the universe based on all observable facts. We dismiss incredibly unlikely things on a daily basis--why not god? The only reason anyone takes the idea of a god seriously is because it's culturally ingrained; it's just as likely that, to quote Dawkins, there's a purple seahorse living in a teacup floating just outside Pluto (not verbatim, but you get the idea).

The two main problems I see for most supposed "hard agnostics" is that they deny or are ignorant of the role and significance of probability in the world of knowledge and evidence, and also of the logical rule of the burden of proof.

Is there any evidence that a ball is any more likely to be inside the box than anything else including and beyond "nothing"? Let me give you a hint: No.

The position of most atheists I am aware of is not one of certain denial of God's existence, but rather of denunciation of such a fallacious assertion of certainty.

Actually the nonbelievers would be pulling out a ladder, cracking open the box and showing the others there was nothing in it. The believers would hide their eyes and say "blessed are they who believe and yet have not seen."

I'm not sure if this helps you out at all, but someone explained Russell's Teapot to me fairly recently, to the point where I finally understood why atheists don't have to prove there isn't a deity. It's because, in science, you assume the null hypothesis. If the argument is, "there is a deity," then the null hypothesis is "there isn't a deity." Research is done, experiments created, etc. to find said deity, and if nothing is found, one assumes no deity.

I'm still open to the possibility there is one, and we just haven't found the right testing method or evidence yet, however the current evidence and methods don't give any indication so far.

Does a agnostic say that Real Madrid's chances of wining against a 10 year old littleput team is 33% because there are 3 results that can possibly happen?

That is basically what this comic suggests. That the options have a equally chance of happening.

The chance that any of the theistic Gods exists is less than a 10 year old paraplegic, blind football team wining 100-0 against Real Madrid.

Yes there is the otherworldly chance they pull it off but betting your money on the kids or even saying that the guy actually betting not only his money but his whole life on the kids is just as sane as the guy betting it all on Real Madrid, is absolutely absurd.

Agnostism is nonsense and a misunderstanding on the word knowledge and fact to mean 100% and not just 99.999999999..%

Of course, the group on the right represents us, and the figure in the middle represents the agnostic - who is unimpressed by our yes/no quibbling.

In reality, the vast majority of atheists are agnostics all the same. We don't claim there is NOTHING in the box, like the right group does in the first panel. We just don't accept the claim because we don't see a proper case made for it.

Maybe I'm a little pedantic about this - but it does help spread this annoying misconception about us, which wastes hours in discussions and debates. ("How are you so sure there is no God?" -"I'm not, I'm just not convinced" "But I thought you were an Atheist?" etc. etc.)

It's not like Gnostic Atheists are popping up everywhere. Religions are too diverse to be able to dismiss every conception of a God. Any Gnostic Atheist I've talked to only pertained that stance in regards to a God described by scriptures.

TL;DR: Comic misrepresents Atheists in a subtle but annoying way to make Agnosticism look better.

You are currently experiencing what everyone else feels about r/atheism.

I also find the lack of curiosity and unwillingness to take a stand incredibly annoying.

The definition of agnosticism does not include a lack of curiosity. It also doesn't take a lack of curiosity to reach agnosticism. It also doesn't take curiosity to step away from agnosticism. Curiosity is basically irrelevant.

It's sort of like your wife getting pregnant, and then someone demanding that you take a stand on what gender it is. Obviously it's going to be male or female (god exists or god doesn't), but until you get an ultrasound or it pops out, you won't know. And saying "I just KNOW it's a boy!" and painting the nursery blue and buying a wardrobe due to your hunch is fine and all, but our perspective is that would be risking a waste of time and money and whatever else. We're, in a sense, "waiting for the results to come through".

I think it's significantly different than that. Similarly to what heb0 pointed out in another comment, there's a real chance of a baby's gender going either way. No one would disagree that it's reasonable to say "I have no idea" regarding a baby's gender.

Now, if I said I was going to bomb your house and you didn't do anything, I think it's safe to say that you didn't believe me. If Christians tell you that you will be condemned to torture worse than you can imagine for the rest of eternity and you respond with "I'll wait and see," it seems like you would have to at the very least believe that it's pretty unlikely.

The only alternative I can think of would be to pretend that you hadn't heard the threat until you forget. We're surprisingly good at that, especially with practice; if I threatened you every week, it probably wouldn't even register anymore. I think that's how it happens for many agnostics, myself included for quite a while - it's an unpleasant topic, and having a belief one way or the other is bound to piss people off, so I just kept putting it off. Soon, the process became automatic. At that point, it was easy to start trying to rationalize my position with faulty analogies like the comic or the baby example.

So, really, I believe agnosticism would be reasonable if religion was merely claiming that "something's out there." When a threat like hell is included, it seems like the only thing maintaining the agnostic has to be fear.

To be clear, I don't think this means anyone identifying as an agnostic is pathetic or ridiculous. It can be really tough to examine a topic like that, especially when that repression could have been in place since childhood. No one has completely examined why they believe and act the way they do.

I couldn't agree more. The whole thing is, we dont know. Curiosity has nothing to do with it. Trying to find out won't get you anywhere if it's basically not possible to find out. You can be infinitely close to the speed of light, but you'll never quite reach it.

There are infinitely many things that might exist, and I don't know that they don't. However, I'll confidently assert that I lack a belief in every single one of them while at the same time saying saying that I don't know that they don't exist.

If your definition of agnosticism is the same as agnostic atheism, I don't think you really have any disagreement with the good majority of atheists. At most, this type of agnosticism just stresses the idea that that absolute confidence is impossible, while agnostic atheism just stresses that the default stance on anything is a lack of belief.

However, I feel like I have substantial disagreements with an agnostic who claims that lack of belief is unjustifiable and that the most reasonable position is some sort of stance precisely in the middle. I would guess that this type of agnostic is either overlooking or ignoring the difference between positive belief and lack of belief, or making what I consider the silly claim that the abstract ideas of "belief" and "surety" aren't separate concepts.

This comic goes on the premise though that there is a box. Now there are tons of boxes in real life, and they commonly store things. So it is not irrational for one side to believe that the box may be full, or for another side to believe that the box may be empty if they have evidence one way or another.

The reality of our present universe, however, has been filled with man-made mythological beings we call gods. There has never been a verified deity in that universe. So it is not rational for one side to say "We think that the deity we believe in is real" when the other side can legitimately say "there has never been a verified deity, and all known deities are man-made and false". Therefore, there is no basis for the theologic claim to be correct and the atheistic claim to be wrong. Only the atheistic claim in this sense has ever been shown to hold any veracity.

What kills me about these types of arguments is how mythology is coddled as if it needs to be given any serious credence at all. The whole "well, we can't disprove the existence of God so therefore....." type of statements (even Carl Sagan thought like this). Yes, we can. We know people have made things up to explain the universe that they didn't understand all of the time. Spirits in rock, sun gods, Zeus and Isis, Jesus, etc. We also realize all of these things are impossible, as fanciful as Jedi knights or Gandalf the Grey. So why pretend?

A correct comic would have had the Atheist saying "I don't know what's in the box. Eventually, through study and observation, we may find out. But we all know what's not in that box: Santa Clause, Loki, Xenu, Jesus, or any other fable. Because they're not real."

The comic would be more accurate if it went:
"there's a ball in the box!"
"what box"
"there's a box up there with a ball in it!"
"I'm confused. I can't see a box"
"oh it is invisible and all powerful. You can't see it but if you believe in it you'll live on after death"
"well, we threw some stones up there and none of them hit anything like a box. What makes you think there's a box?"

The agnostics are the ones saying "we can't be sure there's a box up there". Which is entirely true, except there was never any evidence of a box in the first place.

Atheism is a NOTHING MORE than a denial there is acceptable proof of a god or gods. Not, and this needs to be made very clear, an assertion that there is not a god or are no gods; ergo Agnosticism is a completely redundant position for people who don't know what Atheism is.